Everyone has something to offer, but what is YOUR favourite?

So so so happy to see the uncredited members of Faulconer Productions get the recognition that they deserve.

As a musician myself, I've always been a *strong* defender of Sumitomo's work, always believing that he was held back by circumstance and found geniune value even as his earlier stuff was mocked. To see that not only affirmed, but learning just how harrowing the production was on him as well as the rest of the staff made me geniunely emotional over his journey. To know that the same man that gave us the empowering motifs of Ultra Instinct, Broly, Zamasu and so on went through so much and came out the other side proven himself gives me more respect than I can reasonly describe. He deserves to be recognized as a bonafied legend alongside Kikuchi.

So happy to know you will be covering the lost credits of the Bruce Faulconer score. Ever since I watched the Lost Credits video on Scot Morgan's youtube channel, I've wanted much of the fanbase to know more about it. Those artists deserve some serious love for all the incredible scores they made.

I remember the first time I heard Kikuchi's music on a DVD singlet of DBZ during the Cell Game saga when I was like 11 years old & how while it wasnt what I was used to I enjoyed it a lot, like I did the DUB music & honestly these days I genuinely love all the music. I love Kikuchi for the mystical martial arts adventure vibe fitting for the series But I also Love Faulconer Team score for the Action Superhero show vibe it gave off & just how energetic it was. Hell I remember in High School getting a Bench Press PR in the Weight Room cause of the SSJ3 Faulconer Team theme and my friends hyping me up and multiple tracks from that OST became a staple in my Gym playlist to this day & I'm happy to see so many Dragonball Gym enthusiasts feel the same with that Dub Score But Also Kai is phenomenal as well all thru the Saiyan to Cell Saga and Super Dragon Soul is Immaculate though when they did the Buu Saga of Kai def had some issues with the music in tone for certain scenes when I sat down and watched that. For me it all hits & I can vibe with any of the soundtracks any time of day.

Most impressive part about the music is the fact that all the different soundtracks still have the same unique vibe to it.

Kikuchi and Facloner Score is my top favorite Dragon Ball music. And after hearing the soundtrack from Super Broly, Sumitomo has risen up there. Also gotten respect Johnson's score for getting better with each movie.

yamamoto's music is pretty damn good, despite being plagiarized he would sometimes transform them meaningfully. also really incredible how versatile sumitomo is. some of his tracks just sound like they're composed by totally different people. love a lot of his Kai stuff

It is such good timing this video came out! As someone from Brazil who got to experience DBZ with a Brazilian PT dub, the score we got was the original Japanese one, and so that's the one and only I acknowledged as being the "real deal", and whenever somebody even mentioned the american score, I rolled my eyes thinking it was "just another terrible Americanization of something" to the point I didn't even want to give it a try. However, YESTERDAY, I was watching a video about Dragon Ball that had a very cool score playing in the background. It was a score I had heard many times before in Dragon Ball videos, and possibly one of the coolest ones. I then, for the first time, started to wonder where I had heard that score before, because it was familiar, sure, but I didn't know if it sounded familiar because of the many videos I had watched in which this song was played OR because it was a score from the series itself. I vividly remember all scores from the series, but this one I couldn't be sure about, so I figured it mus be the first option, and that I knew it because of the videos with it in them. Then I checked the comments of that video, and somebody had posted "Any video that has the SS3 theme playing in the background will have my attention" That's the information I needed, it was the "SS3 theme". And then I looked for the scene in which Goku turned SS3 for the first time (Japanese), and that score was nowhere to be found. The score played in that scene is cool in Japanese and very familiar, BUT not as good as the one I was looking for. And then it hit me...."could it be....?" And then I looked for the American version of the same scene, and there it was, that INCREDIBLE piece of music being played in one of the most iconic moments in anime history. And at that moment (about 13 hours ago), not only did I accepet the fact I might be wrong about the American score, but I am eager to listen to everything and find out I had had been missing out this whole time!

Kikuchi’s score is the most enchanting and fitting collection of sounds in any anime ever. Eternally elite.

The Johnson Gogeta theme is something else. How he developed over the years is insane.

Akahito's music for GT in criminally underrated. I absolutely adore it. It makes GT different. It's kind of dreamy and spacey at times. I just love it.

Mark you have absolutely excelled yourself here. This is brilliant. It's also Interesting how the 'Faulconer Team' had the constraints of making sure there was no silence atall. I wonder if this is why this music works so well in the Legacy of Goku games

Well I for one loved Tokunaga's work in GT. The music that plays as Goku transform to SSJ4 is the GOAT.

Oh wow I just happened on this! Nice job! I appreciate the shout out for us ghost writers :) It's wonderful that the community really knows the truth about people like us and Wasserman. I do have to say though I was wondering about Mark Menza and at the last second you brought him in =D Anyway, great job. I really enjoyed it.

Glad a lot of people giving Kikuchi his props

Not enough videos on youtube about DBZ's OST. Really, what an underrated work of art.

FINALLY SOMEONE IS ACTUALLY TALKING ABOUT THE MUSIC

I started watching your videos only this month, Mark, and I'm honestly hooked. I love how deep you get into the making of Dragon Ball and break down what can be learnt as an artist. Keep it up!

The faulconer soundtrack also gets more classical as it goes on, the babidi casts a spell song is amazing.

Kikuchi's music, as well as the various songs used by the show, are celebrated all over the world by the Dragon Ball Symphonic Adventure concert tour.

I have a unique experience of growing up with the Yamamoto’s score because of Kai, Kikuchi’s score because it replaced Yamamoto’s in Kai, and the Faulconer score because of the Orange Bricks. Out of all them I would say Kikuchi is what I associate the franchise with the most. That’s what the rest of the world outside the anglosphere got anyway.

When I think about Dragon Ball and its OST, I think about Kikuchi's score. We got his score in our german dub (we even had german versions of the insert songs in OG DB, but sadly not in DBZ) and I still remember a lot of themes he composed to this day, even though it has been 15+ years since I've made a rewatch of DBZ and 10 since I rewatched DB. It's just.... magical and fits DB's tone perfectly.

I am one of the few people that is actually a fan of the Nathan Johnson score. His work for Fusion Reborn has been so iconic that it’s forever in my brain. I actually liked his work that he did on DBZ. I really wish the level sets could’ve been completed along with the composition that he had in store for the rest of Dragon Ball but sadly, we’ll never get to see the light of day.

Shunsuke Kikuchi's composition puts a smile to my face like seeing a dear old friend.

Something about you talking about Dragon Ball with Kikuchi’s score in the background just warms my heart and brings a smile to my face.

I grew up with the Funimation Orange Box DVDs, the English music, and guitar intro to DBZ is burned into my brain and I love it dearly

Faulconers score will always have a special place in my heart. The coolest for me was an unreleased track called Evil suspense, it plays at the beginning of the final flash vs cell episode. The suspense goes perfect with vegetas shock and awe.

original japanese ost will always be my favorite

There's a reason there are DB/DBZ symphony concert tours worldwide and the entire arena is always filled with pure love and excitement

For me, my go-to composer has always been Faulconer and co. But as I'm watching the original Japanese dub these days, I've gradually warmed up to Kikuchi's work.

What I didn't like about the Faulconer score was that there was always music playing in the background the entire time. Sometimes you just have to let a scene breathe on the shoulders of the voice actors.

Technically, Kikuchi did make a somewhat substantial use of his leitmotifs (as well as producing a fair amount of them in general). The thing is, that level of detail can mostly only be appreciated when watching the movies due to the majority of the post-OG DB material being originally composed for them (with it all being scored to the specific imagery on-screen like most film scores). The people who do the music placement for the show didn't really take into account his thematic development much, so the various themes for Goku (who alone has multiple motifs across the films), Vegeta, Kuririn, Saiyan transformations, and so on aren't capitalized on well enough. Most of their attempts at staying true to his theming were Gohan's and Piccolo's ones, and reusing movie antagonist motifs for series villains. When you hear all his work in the proper context, you can really hear him play with various reoccurring ideas constantly across all those features.

The music of dragon ball will always live on. So joyful, intense and emotional. 🐉

Surprised Mark Menza didn't get a section. His super saiyan riff was iconic to me and is part of the brilliance that finally grew in the best moments of GT

Your channel is amazing! I absolutely love the attention of detail you bring, especially to your Dragonball content!

It's so serendipitous that you posted this because the composers for Funimation's dub of DBZ just performed here at MAGWest

I love Kikuchi's music but also really love the music of the Faulconer score, but my main gripe with it is the fact that it never shuts up, if it would allow things to be silent every once in awhile, it would be perfect.

I adore the GT score. It’s different from kikuchis in all the right ways. I always thought it had a jrpg sound to it

Kikuchi changed my life because of how impactful it was since I grew up watching dragon ball on the orange brick sets and Kikuchi was amazing it really hit hard from Goku and Freeza theme and Cell's theme it really is incredible how amazing the score really was it really also captured the essence of dragon ball for me

I got admire the passion of TotallyNotMark regarding Dragon Ball. He really does a lot of content about the series’s geniuses, and he didn’t even tapped into the Z saga review saga yet.

👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾 Mark, outstanding work! This kind of documentary and the quality of work youve done before this is a true art form. You and I assume your team are a blessing to the Dragonball community and I can't thank you enough for all of your hard work.

Mark, your deep dives remain enthralling and nostalgic, as well as objective. That always makes your analysis fascinating to watch and hear. Just today, my copy of the Rock the Dragon Edition of DBZ arrived in the mail, a piece of my childhood I would constantly lament whenever I watched reruns or BluRays of early DBZ, and while it wasn't the core of why, Ron Wasserman's arrangements were part of what I missed STRONGLY from those rewatches. The Ocean Dub has always been a huge part of my childhood, and as much as Smith, Morgan and Fobos' work on the Funi dub still gives me chills, from SSJ through to SSJ3, it was as early as that first Piccolo theme being interrupted by the impending sting of Raditz that captured why this show's soundtrack is such a vital part of the story telling. This was a blast to watch, and immediately afterwards I rewatched the Raditz arc to confirm if the music does indeed make the moment. IT DOES, and those iconic Ocean Dub scores still hit beautifully. Thankyou for the detailed history lesson, really looking forward to seeing what the future of DragonBall music holds.

Kikuchi is the GOAT, because his choice of instruments are so unique for the medium and still work great. Here in this absolute hidden gem he combines piccolo and goku's (makafushigi adventure) theme into one: Dragon Ball Z BGM - United Forces (M814B) And it's absolutely glorious

The Levi/Wasserman music from the Ocean days is by far my favourite. Something about it is just so atmospheric

Always love it when you put out more Dragon Ball content! Makes my day

Great video. Loved this look behind the scene of Dragonball music.

Kikuchi is quintessential dragonball

Little more detail on Ron Wasserman: Apparently he was a ghost writer for most of Shuki Levy's material and claimed that he composed most of the music for Dragon Ball Z in his home. It was a bold claim but he backed it up by releasing previously unreleased cues from the show! Good job Mark on giving credit where it was due!👍 Ron Wasserman is awesome!🎸 Edit: Also, according to Ron Wasserman, he was totally in control of the musical direction. Claiming that Saban didn't care about Dragon Ball at all. Which is funny since DBZ is bigger than Power Rangers now!😂

I love the transition with team America lol great job! Great video like always!

Kikuchi's score in OG DB always makes me feel so... cozy when I watch it, if that makes any sense

It's refreshing to hear a balanced take on the different soundtracks without bias.

8:39 The Dutch Gamers interview w/ Ron Wasserman: Your rocky sound is pretty clear in Dragon Ball Z, X-Men animated series and of course Power Rangers. They sound the same but yet so different… How do you give a theme song its own vibe? First of all in Dragon Ball Z with “Rock the Dragon” that isn’t me, I know a lot of people think it is. What I did is the score for the first couple years and at least 3 seasons and that was handed to me after I left Saban by Saban because they said; “Look here is a show we don’t really care about, so If you just want to score it at home.. score it."

A truly well made video. While I prefer Kikuchi and Yamamoto over anything and everything, (loved some of the Falcouner era tracks), I was always a huge fan of Nathan Johnson's work. Not only did you include him into your piece but also ended the video with his quote, that made me really happy.

Oh, how i've waited for someone to cover this! I absolutely love the kikunchi score. It is dragon ball for me at it's purest. I keep a playlist on my soundcloud with most of the score at all times. I simply am in love with his work. I really liked GT too tho, don't know what was wrong with it, it was really cool. I was never a fan of the Faulconer score but I respect the work and there are some great exceptions. Amazing video. Really fun knowing all the composers for my favourite anime and their crazy stories. Loved it! I am so looking forward to your dbz review. I've been loving your style of editing for the past few months and I genuinely can't wait for this series. Keep up the beautiful work!

For me the Japanese soundtrack is the best, since it’s the one used for the Latin-American dub. 🔥Trunks theme is the most 90’s soundtrack ever😆.

The Faulconer score is the SHIT for me. Man I love it so freaking much. That music is so nostalgic and badass, and I know some folks hate that its constantly playing, but as someone who loves amvs and music... I LOVE it when the music just suddenly HITS during a fight scene. The guitar, the bass... ah, so many freaking awesome theme songs! The Faulconer score is so special to me I literally feel like scenes are MISSING something without it. It's like tryna eat a delicious steak without chilli! Frustrating! That soundtrack gives me freaking goosebumps. But I like the Kikuchi score for the original Dragon Ball series. Its more magical and upbeat, less hardcore, which fits the tone of kid Goku's adventures.

When I heard that Kikuchi score i felt the nostalgia drop on me. So beautiful and fitting. The Bruce Faulconer Production (Everyone from that era) ones also arent behind on that but as i grew up i understand the issues they have with his tracks being same-y but still hold a special place in my heart

When I think of Dragonball, Kikuchi is the second name that comes to mind. His work is Dragonball for me. I was devastated when I learned of his passing but the fact that so many db fans till this day love and celebrate his score makes me incredibly happy. But I have to say Sumitomo's later work in Super has an iconic status now too.

thank you so much for covering the faulconer shit. as a musician one of my greatest fears is having that done to me. That and what happened with marty o'donnell give me all sorts of anxiety lol

dude mark ive been following your videos for like 5 or 6 years, and seeing your videos mature from alright top ten videos to genuinly thought provoking spectaculars was incredible I am so excited for this Z review, and i know it will not dissapoint!

Incredible work as always, TNM! These videos are tremendous, and I can't fathom the amount of work that goes into them. Loved your individual take on each score that makes up DB as a franchise, and while I respect those that love Kikuchi, I can't watch DBZ without Faulconer's crew. Frieza vs. Piccolo, Goku's SSJ theme, Vegeta's theme and SSJ theme, Trunks' first appearance, Cell's theme, Super Buu's theme, and so many, many others that make up that soundtrack define my experience with DBZ and are just as responsible as DB the anime itself as to why I love anime as a genre to begin with. For me, Faulconer Production is DBZ as much as I think of Kikuchi specifically being tied to DB.

I love this topic because the Falconer and kikuchi scores each give the series different vibes.

The Faulconer score (actually the Mike, Scott and Julius score) will always be my fav because not only is it nostalgic, but from an objective point of view its just so bad ass and perfectly fits DBZ in my eyes (ears). it just sounds amazing and it always fits the themes of the scenes perfectly

Here in Brazil it became a tradition that both Dragon Ball and Pokemon always have a localized version of the opening, and they are always bangers.

Too bad that when we talk about listen all the soundtracks through official releases... this turns into a tragedy: - Kikuchi has a lot of his music (DB-DBZ) scattered through the many albums with the songs from Z, movies; and in a single track there could be 2 or 3 themes mixed in it, plus a lot of his scored was never released, Like the music from the movie 3. - Tokunaga music is almost completely unreleased, a few tracks (also used in the movie: The Path to Power) were released on the same CDs with Kikuchi. - Ocean Score is completely unreleased . - Faulconer came to release 10 CDs... but even so, almost half of the total score remains unreleased (and unfortunately those are their best tracks). For some reason, they repeated some tracks in other CDs, many tracks were taken from the episodes (some transitioning from other track) instead of using the immaculate composition, and a lot of content from the early Buu saga was released compared to the other sagas (maybe because that saga was on air on par with these releases). Sadly, they left out almost all the material composed in the Freezer saga (where their score was at its peak imo). - Menza is completely unreleased. - Johnson too. - Yamamoto's score is ironically the best treated one, only 2 of his tracks remain unreleased, "Gohan Awakening" and "Creature of Marvel-Slow". The sad thing is that he was caught 3 weeks before his last album was released with these 2 tracks and 6 unknown tracks that were possibly variations on already released tracks. - Sunitomo' score for Kai 2014 is half unreleased, just like Faulconer, these are even better than the released ones, just compare "Effective Attack" with "A hearbreaking farrewell".

9:06 - 9:11 It’s funny how this statement could apply to both Faulconer and Yamamoto in different ways

i really like hiroshi takaki's (episode of bardock and 2010 plan to eradicate the saiyans ova) music. it's a shame nobody ever talks about him. still praying for an official release for his score.

The original score of DB is the first thing that comes to my mind when I think of the anime adaptation. What Kikuchi brought to the franchise is beyond iconic. And I can say that Sumimoto's score in ToP arc is also sublime, it was great to know how he went through the first problems in early Super.

Finally, a video essay about the history of Dragon Ball music/score. This video will be legendary!

Great video! I’m a huge dragon ball fan that loves all the music despite the inconsistency/controversy so I really appreciate this deeper insight.

Kinda disappointed that Mark Menza's score wasn't a part of this conversation. Considering he scored a lot of the DBZ films and DBGT.

The opening rift to Rock The Dragon still gets me hyped to this day

Cant wait to see the dbz reveiws your channel is part of the reason i got into dragon ball in the first place. So glad that your team has made fan❤

Shunsuke Kikuchi and Norihito Sumitomo, the best ever! Both got me emotional in so many ways, sadness, joy, rage, you name it! I always get goosebumps whenever I think of scenes with their music on. After the late legendary Kikuchi, to me the ultimate successor is Sumitomo, keep him forever, it gives me joy whenever I see his name on Dragon Ball projects!

I'm feel bad I absolutely love the Yamamoto score, it fits so well for the series

As an english speaker who grew up watching the dub of Dragon Ball through the orange bricks I absoletely love Kikuchi's score and I still listen to many of his tracks of dragon ball when ever I'm driving to work, and I unironically really love Tokunaga's music of GT as it's style reminded me of a lot of video game music from the 1990's. I even recently have decided to finally watch the original english broadcast dub out of curiosity, and while none of Wasserman's music really stood out to me as I honestly found the instrumentations to be kind off boring I actually did found my self likening the Faulconer era music quite a bit as it has a lot of 90's style instrumentation and I like how the music is synced to the action on screen . Though even with all of the different composers I would still say Kikuchi's is the absolute best as I love it's timeless score and it perfectly fits the story Dragon Ball.

thank you for the nostalgia trip I needed that today

Someone online said it perfectly about the soundtracks, the original OST made DBZ feel like a old marital arts film while the Faulconer OST made DBZ feel like a sci-fi adventure film

Honestly, I love all the eras of dragon ball music. It is one of the aspects of dragon ball that has remained broadly consistent in terms of its quality whether its Kakuchi, Faulconer, Wasserman, Sumitomo, or any other composer who has worked on the show each score has its own identity and meaning that has formed wonderful memories for millions around the world and millions more to come.

For me, Yamamoto got me into the franchise so that’s my score to start. I got a lot of love for Kikuchi’s score , it grew on me over the years. As for the American score, I is the Cartoon Network era vibes of Faulconer. All in all, each composer did a great job.

Rest in paradise to both Kikuchi and Akita ❤️ takes me back to my childhood with the big orange boxes. Blessed to have had such a wonderful childhood and now, wonderful memories. Love you ma and pops ❤️❤️

Hot dang... You've made some good videos in the past, but this one just takes the cake. Great work. I'd also like to add, and it something you seemed to have alluded to without directly saying it. To expand on the art part. Music is story. It's the collective journey of the person writing it and what the music is meant to represent. You can hear it in the placement to the visuals, and especially as you go from what was written in the start to what the finale's eventually lead to. Thanks for shining a light onto this subject overall and keep up the good work!

“From episode 1 of dragon ball right through till Goku forgot he had a family and left to train uub” Truly a masterpiece WTF sentence

Even though the music is plagiarized, the yamamoto score will always be my favorite score in dragon ball z

Thank you for not crapping on our favorite versions, great video thanks

One comment about Julius. He actually did a lot of live orchestra music in Europe before coming over to work on DBZ, so some of your observations about his style actually make a lot of sense.

35 minutes and it didnt even begin to mention the absolute mess that was the GT replacement music story with Mark Menza. Mark's saga and the fight over Falconers' signature inside of Funi is a whole other video in of itself lmao. His style of music is what defines GT for so many people in the modern era and it's odd not to see him mentioned considering the impact he had.

"Kakuchi's tunes are 80's anime vibes" ... That's because he created the vibe...

I'm running a Dragon Ball tabletop game, so I've done a good amount of research into Dragon Ball music myself. There's a LOT to unpack lol. Very excited to watch this video

Thank you for being the only youtuber to use the RIGHT Gogeta theme.

Can you imagine what it must have felt like for Kikuchi when they changed the soundtrack to Dragon Ball in America? You spend a decade making music for a series, only for that work to go overseas, and some higher up listens to your score and goes "lol nah."

I don't have a lot if nostalgia for dragon ball, but, in large part probably causex by DBZA, Kikuchi's score is very nostalgic to me. Also the Faulconer score in the buu arc was very memorable to me as well

Crazy how I've been a Dragon Ball fan all my life and I'm still learning so much new shit about it almost 25 years later. Thank you.

Amazing video! I would love a short breakdown video of Super Heros music tho bc there's some real bangers in there!

Kikuchi soundtrack all day

Kikuchi's score (RIP) made Dragon ball and Dragon ball Z iconic, there's nothing else quite like it and it can never be replicated, his music fits the whole dragon ball story perfectly. He's the one who made Dragon ball world sound colorful and full of adventure, but his battle themes also hit hard, he also provided tons of atmospheric and heartfelt tracks too, ones that touched your soul. His soundtrack only gets better with time, absolutely legendary. I also respect all of the other composers that did Dragon ball too, their work won't be forgotten.

I think its great that pretty much all the scores are charming in their own way. I have so much love for multiple

Absolutely love knowing all this in depth shit since so many of us were only really exposed to a few and boy does music get overlooked in media. One of those if it's done good enough no one noticed but it also makes so much difference. Thanks for your hard work this was fascinating. Looking forward to the DBZ review 🤩🤩🤩

Hot take: I’m more upset that Yamamoto got caught…over what he did…-runs away and hides-